Part 12

But in later years he had outgrown this mood. John Wesley wrote _No_ against the last line of the stanza, and in his hymn-book gave—

Since _faith_ alone confirms me His.

The brothers taught that sanctification was progressive, yet might be ‘cut short in righteousness,’ a phrase which they often quoted. In one of the hymns for those that wait for ‘full redemption,’[151] Charles Wesley writes—

Surely I have pardon found, Grace doth more than sin abound, God, I know, is pacified; Thou for me, for me hast died; But I cannot rest herein, All my nature still is sin, Comforted I will not be Till my soul is all like Thee.

See my burdened, sin-sick soul, Give me faith, and make me whole! Finish Thy great work of grace, Cut it short in righteousness. Speak the second time, ‘Be clean!’ Take away my inbred sin; Now the stumbling-block remove, Cast it out by perfect love.

This doctrine of what has been called ‘the second blessing’ is often met with in Charles Wesley, but he used expressions which John disapproved, and would not repeat in his _Collection_, as in the second verse of the great hymn, ‘Love divine, all loves excelling,’ which reads—

Breathe, O breathe Thy loving Spirit, Into every troubled breast; Let us all in Thee inherit, Let us find that second rest; Take away the power of sinning, Alpha and Omega be; End of faith as its beginning, Set our hearts at liberty.

John Fletcher suggested that ‘power’ should be altered to ‘love.’

The Wesleys’ teaching concerning sanctification had an immense influence upon Methodist life and thought. ‘The pursuit of holiness,’ to use Dean Goulburn’s phrase, was the daily interest and delight of multitudes of devout souls. No doubt in many cases there was more or less of morbid introspection, but the rich treasury of Methodist biography witnesses to the saintliness of those who made the search for ‘full redemption,’ or, as they delighted to say, ‘perfect love,’ the one serious business of life.

Important and influential as this section of Wesley’s _Hymns_ is, not many of the best are found here.[152] The finest are John Wesley’s translations from the German but only a few original compositions are of marked value. Some exceptions, indeed, must be made, notably—

Love divine, all loves excelling;

and there are many verses inspired by that thirst of the soul ‘for God, yea, even for the living God,’ which is characteristic of no one Church or age, but of all elect souls restless till they find rest in Him. The varying moods of the seeker after God are impressively illustrated. Some of the hymns are of a solemn and even sombre type, while others are bright with assurance of the favour of God and the gladness of the redeemed. Here are a few verses from a

HYMN TO GOD THE SANCTIFIER

Come, Holy Ghost, all quickening fire! Come, and my hallowed heart inspire, Sprinkled with the atoning blood; Now to my soul Thyself reveal, Thy mighty working let me feel, And know that I am born of God.

Thy witness with my spirit bear, That God, my God, inhabits there; Thou, with the Father, and the Son, Eternal Light’s co-eval Beam; Be Christ in me, and I in Him, Till perfect we are made in one.

Let earth no more my heart divide, With Christ may I be crucified, To Thee with my whole soul aspire; Dead to the world and all its toys, Its idle pomp, and fading joys, Be thou alone my one desire!

Be Thou my joy, be Thou my dread; In battle cover Thou my head, Nor earth nor hell I then shall fear; I then shall turn my steady face, Want, pain, defy, enjoy disgrace, Glory in dissolution near.

My will be swallowed up in Thee; Light in Thy light still may I see, Beholding Thee with open face; Called the full power of faith to prove, Let all my hallowed heart be love, And all my spotless life be praise.

Come, Holy Ghost, all-quickening fire, My consecrated heart inspire, Sprinkled with the atoning blood; Still to my soul Thyself reveal, Thy mighty working may I feel, And know that I am one with God!

Of the other type two bright verses on 1 Chron. xxix. 5 are a good example—

Lord, in the strength of grace, With a glad heart and free, Myself, my residue of days I consecrate to Thee.

Thy ransomed servant, I Restore to Thee Thine own, And, from this moment, live or die To serve my God alone.

These two verses belong to the very extensive series of

6. Hymns on Passages of Holy Scripture

Charles Wesley’s poetry is always sanctified by the word of God. In this regard he is unsurpassed, and I think unequalled, by any other writer. He thought and wrote in the language of the Bible, and constantly weaves into his hymns the words, phrases, incidents of Holy Scripture. No one ‘spiritualized’ more boldly than he. Of this his most famous poem, ‘Wrestling Jacob,’ is the great example. Many other hymns illustrate the same power, e.g. this verse, which ‘spiritualizes’ Peter’s deliverance from prison—

Long my imprisoned spirit lay Fast bound in sin and nature’s night; Thine eye diffused a quickening ray, I woke, the dungeon flamed with light; My chains fell off, my heart was free, I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.

and this, which refers in the same fashion to the resurrection of Lazarus—

Buried in sin, Thy voice I hear, And burst the barriers of my tomb, In all the marks of death appear, Forth at Thy call, though bound, I come.

His more formal paraphrases are often very fine, and are hymns of permanent worth. Such are—

None is like Jeshurun’s God (Deut. xxxiii. 26-29).

Wherewith, O God, shall I draw near (Mic. vi. 6-8).

Away my unbelieving fear (Hab. iii. 17, 18).

Of course Charles Wesley wrote many Psalm-versions. Comparatively few are above the average, but there are some exceptions. Among these are the 48th—

Great is our redeeming Lord, In power, and truth, and grace.

the 84th—

How lovely are Thy tents, O Lord! Where’er Thou choosest to record Thy name, or place Thy house of prayer, My soul outflies the angel-choir, And faints, o’erpowered with strong desire, To meet Thy special presence there.

the 121st—

To the hills I lift mine eyes, The everlasting hills.

the 125th—

Who in the Lord confide And feel His sprinkled blood, In storms and hurricanes abide, Firm as the mount of God.

Often only two or three verses can be taken from a long poem, as in Ps. iii.—

Thou, Lord, art a shield for me.[153]

and Ps. ix.—

Thee will I praise with all my heart.

Here the whole psalm, as it appears in the _Poetical Works_, consists of fourteen verses, most of them impossible for singing in a Christian Church, but there are four good verses, especially this, with its tender trustfulness that the humble seeker must at length find his Saviour—

A helpless soul that looks to Thee Is sure at last Thy face to see, And all Thy goodness to partake; The sinner who for Thee doth grieve, And longs, and labours to believe, Thou never, never wilt forsake.[154]

The 23rd Psalm is also very beautiful, and is worthy to take its place amongst the many lovely renderings of this sweetest of the praises of Israel. I venture to quote the whole, as it is little known outside Wesleyan Methodism, and not too well known in our own Church. It is the 23rd Psalm read in the light of the tenth chapter of St. John’s Gospel.

Jesus the good Shepherd is; Jesus died the sheep to save; He is mine, and I am His; All I want in Him I have, Life, and health, and rest, and food, All the plenitude of God.

Jesus loves and guards His own; Me in verdant pastures feeds; Makes me quietly lie down, By the streams of comfort leads: Following Him where’er He goes, Silent joy my heart o’erflows.

He in sickness makes me whole, Guides into the paths of peace; He revives my fainting soul, Stablishes in righteousness; Who for me vouchsafed to die, Loves me still,—I know not why!

Unappalled by guilty fear, Through the mortal vale I go; My eternal Life is near; Thee my Life, in death I know; Bless Thy chastening, cheering rod Die into the arms of God!

Till that welcome hour I see, Thou before my foes dost feed; Bidd’st me sit and feast with Thee, Pour’st Thy oil upon my head; Giv’st me all I ask, and more, Mak’st my cup of joy run o’er.

Love divine shall still embrace, Love shall keep me to the end; Surely all my happy days I shall in Thy temple spend, Till I to Thy house remove, Thy eternal house above!

Dr. Watts’s ‘grand design’ in his version of the Psalter was ‘to teach’ the ‘author to speak like a Christian.’ Charles Wesley took St. Augustine’s view, that we ought to hear the voice of Christ in all the psalms. His version of Ps. xlv. is typical of his attitude toward the Psalter as a whole.

My heart is full of Christ, and longs Its glorious matter to declare! Of Him I make my loftier songs, I cannot from His praise forbear; My ready tongue makes haste to sing The beauties of my heavenly King.

In 1762 Charles Wesley took advantage of a time of physical weakness to write a large number of verses, forming a kind of running commentary on the Holy Scriptures. They are, for the most part, purely devotional; but the events of the time and, perhaps, of the day on which a poem was written are mirrored in some of the verses. In the preface he says—

Many of the thoughts are borrowed from Mr. Henry’s _Commentary_, Dr. Gell on the _Pentateuch_, and Bengelius on the _New Testament_. Several of the hymns are intended to prove, and several to guard, the doctrine of Christian Perfection. I durst not publish one without the other. In the latter sort I use some severity.

On this point the brothers differed, and especially as to the method of treating those who discredited the doctrine by extravagance in teaching or by inconsistency of life.

The _Short Poems_ account for the enormous number of Charles Wesley’s hymns. On the Old Testament he wrote 1,609, on the New Testament 3,491, a total of 5,100 poetical notes on the Holy Scripture. But very many consist of only one verse.[155] By skilful combination some very good hymns have been made, and in a few instances we come upon a complete hymn of great strength or beauty. Many of these are familiar in Methodist congregations, though probably few worshippers recognize the passages of Scripture which suggested the verses. The well-known hymn

A charge to keep I have,

is the poet’s meditation and prayer after reading Lev. viii. 35: ‘Therefore shall ye abide at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation day and night seven days, and keep the charge of the Lord, that ye die not.’ After reading Lev. vi. 13: ‘The fire shall ever be burning upon the altar; it shall never go out,’ he prays

O Thou who camest from above The pure celestial fire to impart, Kindle a flame of sacred love On the mean altar of my heart!

There let it for Thy glory burn With inextinguishable blaze; And trembling to its source return, In humble prayer and fervent praise.

On the words ‘merciful and gracious’ in Exod. xxxiv. 6 he comments

Mercy is Thy distinguished Name, And suits the sinner best.

On the twenty-ninth verse of the same chapter, ‘Moses wist not that his face shone,’ he writes

Thine image if Thou stamp on me, Let others, Lord, the brightness see, By me unseen, unknown.

As these verses are buried in the last four volumes of the _Poetical Works_, I venture to quote a few others which have, I think, some special value, reminding one at times of Herbert or Crashaw.

‘The Lord went His way’ (Gen. xviii. 33).

Unwearied let us still request By instant prayer whate’er we want: The patriarch from asking ceased, Before the Almighty ceased to grant.

‘O my Lord, I am not eloquent’ (Exod. iv. 10).

How ready is the man to go Whom God hath never sent! How timorous, diffident, and slow God’s chosen instrument! Lord, if from Thee this mark I have Of a true Messenger, By whom Thou wilt Thy people save, And let me always fear.

Slow of speech and slower still Of heart, alas! am I, Cannot utter what I feel, Or speak to the Most High: But I to my Brother look, Mighty both in word and deed: He my cause hath undertook And lives for me to plead.

‘Where hast thou gleaned to-day?’ (Ruth ii. 19).

At evening to myself I say, My soul, where hast thou gleaned to-day, Thy labours how bestowed? What hast thou rightly said or done? What grace attained or knowledge won, In following after God?

‘Oh that I knew where I might find Him’ (Job xxxiii. 3).

Where but on yonder tree? Or if too rich thou art, Sink into poverty, And find Him in thine heart.

‘Israel served for a wife’ (Hos. xii. 12).

While Jacob for a wife doth wait, A length of servile years (His love to Rachel is so great) As a few days appears: And shall I think it long to stay Or wish my labours passed? A thousand years are but a day If Christ be mine at last.

These verses on Num. xi. 27, 28 are in a different strain.

Eldad, they said, and Medad there, Irregularly bold, By Moses uncommissioned dare A separate meeting hold! And still whom none, but Heaven, will own, Men whom the world decry, Men authorized by God alone Presume to prophesy!

How often have I blindly done What zealous Joshua did, Impatient to the rulers run And cried, ‘My lords, forbid!’ Silence the schismatics; constrain Their _thoughts_ with ours to agree; And sacrifice the souls of men To idol unity!

John Wesley lets this pass without note or comment, but when, on Num. xvi. 10, Charles wrote

Raised from the people’s lowest lees, Guard, Lord, Thy preaching witnesses, Nor let their pride the honour claim Of sealing covenants in Thy name.

he notes on the first line, ‘Query? J. W.’

Here our detailed consideration of Charles Wesley’s hymns must end, though there are many others over which one would be glad to linger. Some of the hymns on Death and the Future Life are of great power, though some have lost and others are losing their hold upon Methodist worshippers. Charles Wesley’s view of death is well illustrated in these verses, which I quote the more readily because, to my regret, they are not found in the _Methodist Hymn-book_. If they could not often be sung in the congregation, there are times when they would speak the inmost feeling of the devout disciple.

O when shall we sweetly remove, O when shall we enter our rest, Return to the Sion above, The mother of spirits distressed!

Not all the archangels can tell The joys of that holiest place, When Jesus is pleased to reveal The light of His heavenly face.

’Tis good at Thy word to be here, ’Tis better in Thee to be gone, And see Thee in glory appear, And rise to a share of Thy throne.

To mourn for Thy coming is sweet, To weep at Thy longer delay; But Thou, whom we hasten to meet, Shalt chase all our sorrows away.

This is not the tone of modern worship. It is open to the charge of that ‘other-worldliness’ of which our time is so impatient and knows so little, but it is the language of the disciples whom Jesus loves. ‘Having the desire to depart and be with Christ: for it is very far better.’ ‘He which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus!’

After Charles Wesley, Methodism had no great hymn-writer, though Thomas Olivers (1725-99), one of the early preachers, wrote one of the finest of our hymns of adoration.

He was a man of considerable ability, but Wesley had more confidence in him as a corrector of errors of doctrine than of errors of the press. He left Toplady to be ‘corrected by one that is full his match, Mr. Thomas Olivers,’ but he rejected Olivers as assistant-editor of the _Arminian Magazine_, because ‘the errata are insufferable.’

‘The God of Abraham praise’ was published at Nottingham in a pamphlet of eight pages, with the title, ‘A Hymn to the God of Abraham. In three parts, adapted to a celebrated air, sung by the priest, Signior Leoni, &c., at the Jews’ Synagogue in London.’ There is only slight verbal resemblance between Olivers’ version and the Hebrew original.[156] He wrote a few other hymns, not to be compared with this, yet indicating considerable poetic power. One of them, ‘On the Last Judgement,’ was published at ‘Leedes.’ It contained twenty verses, and was afterwards altered, and enlarged to thirty-six verses, Scripture references being given in the margin of almost every line. Some verses of this poem have been occasionally used in hymn-books, and Lord Selborne gave twelve verses in his _Book of Praise_. It is, however, little known. The following are among the best verses.

Come, immortal King of Glory! Now with all Thy saints appear; While astonished worlds adore Thee, And the dead Thy clarions hear, Shine refulgent, And Thy Deity maintain.

Lo! He comes with clouds descending: Hark! the trump of God is blown: And the archangel’s voice attending, Makes the high procession known. Sons of Adam, Rise and stand before your God!

‘Come, Lord Jesus, O come quickly,’ Oft has prayed the mourning Bride. Lo! He answers, ‘I come quickly’; Who Thy coming may abide? All who loved Him, All who longed to see His day.

Come, He saith, ye heirs of glory, Come, ye purchase of My blood, Claim the kingdom now before you, Rise and fill the mount of God: Fixed for ever, Where the Lamb on Sion stands.

Now their trials all are ended, Now the dubious warfare’s o’er, Joy no more with sorrow blended, They shall sigh and weep no more: God for ever Wipes the tear from every eye.

Hail! Thou Alpha and Omega! First and last of all alone. He that is, and was, and shall be, And beside whom there is none. Take the glory, Great Eternal Three in One!

Praise be to the Father given: Praise to the co-eval Son: Praise the Spirit, One and Seven; Praise the mystic Three in One. Hallelujah! Everlasting praise be Thine.

John Bakewell (1721-1819), a Methodist schoolmaster, wrote several hymns, and is widely known as the author of ‘Hail, Thou once despisèd Jesus.’[157] Benjamin Rhodes (1743-1815), converted under the preaching of Whitefield, and for many years a Methodist preacher, wrote one really fine hymn, ‘My heart and voice I raise.’ Another of the early Methodist preachers, John Murlin, ‘the weeping prophet,’ published a small volume of hymns, some of which are quite as good as most of the eighteenth-century songs.

IV Eighteenth-century Hymns

III.—The Olney Hymns

The contribution of evangelical Churchmen, apart from the Wesleys, to the hymnody of the eighteenth century, is slight, with the important exception of the remarkable collection of hymns issued by William Cowper and John Newton, which takes its title from the little Buckinghamshire town in which Newton was for years curate for an absentee vicar.

Our little England has been the mother of so many famous sons that it often happens that some out-of-the-way village or obscure country town is rich in memories of the great and good, for

Half of her dust has walked the rest In poets, heroes, martyrs, sages.

Such a spot is Olney, the town of Cowper and of Cowper’s Mary, of John Newton, and for a time of Thomas Scott, of whom Newman speaks as ‘the writer who made a deeper impression on my mind than any other, and to whom (humanly speaking) I almost owe my soul.’[158] Where William Carey, after some hesitation on the ground of his slight abilities, was ‘allowed to go on preaching,’ and finally sent forth to the ministry by the unanimous vote of the Baptist Church, over which John Sutcliff presided. Where also Dr. H. J. Gauntlett, when a boy of ten, was organist at the parish church.[159]

The Olney hymns are at once the ‘monument’ of ‘an intimate and endeared friendship’ and of a memorable literary partnership. ‘The old African blasphemer’ must have felt it even more a matter of thankfulness that he found himself collaborating with William Cowper than that he should become minister of the nearest church to the Mansion House. John Newton’s romantic story is too well known to be repeated here. He is a unique figure in the Christian choir, and the story of our hymn-writers would be vastly poorer if his life were omitted.

Influenced, as he gladly recognized, by the mother who died when he was a boy of seven, his soul lay open to intellectual and spiritual impressions, even in the midst of his wanderings and sins. Euclid, as well as Thomas à Kempis, shared in the saving of his soul and kept him from sinking to the level of his companions and oppressors. His hair-breadth escapes were so many and so remarkable that he might well regard them as interpositions of Providence, indicating that he was ‘a chosen vessel’ whom God had designated to special work when his hour should come.

Among the many interesting men who occupy secondary places in the religious life of the eighteenth century, he is one of the most interesting and attractive. The promise of his childhood blighted by the death of his mother, his restless, roving, adventurous manhood, his pursuit of knowledge under difficulties, his seven years’ faithful love for Mary Catlett, thoughts of whom were never absent from his mind for an hour amidst all his ‘misery and wretchedness,’ the unegotistic frankness of his _Authentic Narrative_, his profound and thankful modesty,

The genuine meek humility, The wonder why such love to me,

his genius for friendship, his good-humoured perplexity as to his proper theological and ecclesiastical affinities, his ready wit and manly tenderness, unite to make John Newton’s a name over which one may well linger.

He was a Calvinist for the same reason that the Wesleys were Arminians. They were convinced that only a love divine which included every soul of man could have stooped to them. Newton believed that only God’s determinate counsel could have set such wandering feet as his upon the rock and established his goings. To such elect souls the divers ways of contradictory theologies blend in the one path which leads the sinner to the Saviour. ‘The views,’ he says, ‘I have received of the doctrines of grace, are essential to my peace, and I could not live a day or an hour without them.’ He found them ‘friendly to holiness,’ and it was not in him to be ‘ashamed of them.’ One of his favourite stories was of an old woman near Olney, whose views on predestination suited him exactly. ‘Ah! I have long settled that point; for if God had not chosen me before I was born, I am sure He would have seen nothing in me to have chosen me for afterwards.’ But we can well believe that he was not a satisfactory Calvinist from the ‘highest’ point of view. ‘There were two sorts of Calvinists at Olney,’ he said, ‘and they always reminded me of the two baskets of Jeremiah’s figs.’

His Churchmanship was like his Calvinism, convinced but liberal, almost easy-going. He writes to his friend, William Bull—